TnRiver46

Another idea, my buddy uses a ned rig instead of a drop shot weight. I will say it takes him a while to rig up tho haha

I can rust a piece of plastic

Anytime buddy. If you’re into white bass there is a crazy yearly run between leadvale and rankin on the upper end of Douglas, lots of fun

@padlin, hahah!! My buddy went to boundary waters this summer and took the wheels. He said it was nothing but rocks and logs on the portage trails and he had to carry the wheels the whole way 😂

Straight from the horse’s mouth

Natural lakes? Negative. There’s only one in the entire state and it was formed by a massive earthquake in the early 1800s . It’s called reelfoot lake and it’s near the Mississippi River, the earthquake sloshed a bunch of water out of the river into a low lying area. Loaded with crappie and bass but the lake is slowly drying up over time

Tried it , line always broke rubbing on rocks.

It’s dependent upon precipitation but they leave it full from June- August/sept. It’s when the line is at its highest on those pics I posted

Well, it did suffer the worst flood since 1791 in late sept Early October. They installed a mile long boom to remove all the junk floating down (siding, insulation, lumber, etc). There are barges still removing massive amounts of debris to this day, so the cards are stacked against you right now. It is very easy to find when they start raising the lake. Tva.com and the Tva app will tell you, among other places. Pre internet we used to just call the number and a recording would tell you all lake info. The “operating guide” function for each lake will show you a line graph of current lake levels. It usually starts going up in March and is fullish in June then starts dropping in August/sept. You can see the spike in last years graph from the flood here. These are the same graph, top one is with my phone sideways and bottom one is with phone vertical. As for the fishing off the bank, never done much of that, it will ruin your shoes. People slay crappie off the bank in Nina creek and at swanns marina in late winter/early spring. I don’t know where you could even access it, I live about an hour away. I would personally fish off the rocks right below the dam, that’s just what I like. Not sure if it’s reopened after the flood, a lot of things washed away. Lots of walleye, bass, crappie, white bass, etc. there

I saw a tourney interview somewhere along the way, tons of anglers had worked an area throwing bladed jigs and not caught much at all. I believe it was Brian Schmitt that came in behind everyone and waxed the fish. The difference? He was throwing straight braid and of course the masses were throwing fluoro. Somebody walked up to his boat after the tourney and noticed all his bladed jigs had the paint worn off the head. They asked him why, he said using braid they bang harder and that’s why he got all the bites just something I heard long ago that stuck in my head

Tired of paddling ?? I ♥️ paddling

I use the shad

@volzfan59, bout time you came back home! I didn’t know you were that close to LA, had a few in-laws in those stomping grounds

^one of the reasons many records are never submitted. The guy that caught the world record SMB said he wishes he had never caught it, seems like he said something to the effect of it was the worst thing that ever happened to him.

^one of the fee grabbingest states there is for outdoor activities

If you’ve ever had to replace a power head, you’ll never forget 💴

Biggest understatement of 2025 right there 😂 😂

Glad you had a good trip! The skin is really thick on hands and arms too…….

If only @Woody B was here to chime in…… actually you could probably just access his old reports. Seems like he caught some of each every trip out in NC I get maybe 1 spot to every 10-12 smallies but always just fishing, never done anything different to try to target them there are a few places where there are always a few ky spots on the rivers, not sure why but they are there no matter what. One is ultra fast water behind a bridge pillar

I boat flipped a fish today, and my buddy did get video of it. I also lay fish down on the boat to measure them all the time. I don’t really think it hurts them much. Fish continuously regenerate their slime coat

@Swamp Girl, that was when I was catching shad near home early this AM. It was up into the mid 30s by the time we got to the lake and was almost pleasant by afternoon

Had some time on the water this weekend, the smallmouth were biting Saturday: Got out in the kayak around 9. I had some nightcrawlers and had also saved some shad I’ve been catching on some random stops at creek mouths near home. It was really windy so I had to get stuck up against rocks or trees to slow down enough to fish. Tossed one of the dead shad up against a deep rock cliff and it got hit hard, swing and miss. Rebait, same thing. This happened 4-5 times and I finally hooked it, a big ole smallie jumps and dives down into the tree I was up against. It finally swims free and tows me out to deep water. It got way down deep up against the cliff and got me wrapped up in something else. I tried to free it for 10 minutes paddling in circles around it in the waves, it was plum stuck. I finally had to break the line. After that I got a couple fish with nightcrawlers, one smallie in the 2 lb range and a spotted bass that I brought home to eat. Sunday: took my motor boat out with a couple buddies. Prior to fishing I went downtown to crackhead creek early this morning and netted about 100 threadfin shad for our excursion. It was 26 degrees my hands froze but they were worth it, smallies loved them. We started fishing around 10:30 and it took a while but Craig caught the first one, nice thick SMB. I then hooked one that got stuck in a tree but it finally came loose, Rich captured the escape on film. I was using 33 lb braid and 12 lb seaguar pounce leader, it held thru the ordeal. I had tied the leader knot yesterday in the kayak and forgot to check it today, still going strong The offshore action slowed so we hit some cliffs, I picked up a couple more went back offshore on the way to the truck and Rich got 2 19” fish within 10 minutes of each other fun times, good scenery, and of course the lucky loon wss swimming around us